Smoothies
by siophiefandom
Summary: Emily keeps coming back to Paige's smoothie shop. Paige is anything but smooth. Quickie. Paily. (The latest in my series of one-shots with titles that start with "S.")
1. Chapter 1

"So, then I told Coach..." Spencer's voice trailed off when she realized that Paige was no longer paying attention. Paige was planted in front of the smoothie machine, staring at her reflection in its shiny, polished surface, teasing at her hair. Spencer sighed resignedly. "Oh, gee. Is it 8:30 already?" she droned sarcastically, glancing at the time on her cash register to confirm the reason behind Paige's distraction.

Paige looked back at her with a shy smile, as if she had no idea what Spencer was talking about.

"Are you, at least, going to talk to her today? 'Hi!'" Spencer suggested, demonstrating with a wide smile and a wave. "'Welcome to Smoothie World!'" Same gesture. "'Want to go back to the break room and make out?'"

Paige, whose face was already becoming flush, hid her head in her hands at that last statement.

"I'm just saying, Paige! You spend a good five minutes making yourself beautiful before this girl shows up," - Spencer pulled on a lock of Paige's hair, teasing it and letting it fall; then, letting her hands fall on Paige's shoulders - "and, then, when she does show up, you turn around and hide! I swear, it's a good thing you're not this timid in field hockey!"

Paige, hearing the hum of the motors that opened the automatic doors, shrugged out from under Spencer's hands as in walked the girl of her dreams: White socks, white running shoes, black running shorts, a sleeveless USWNT jersey, and a few beads of sweat that she dabbed away with the napkin that she had picked up from the dispenser on her way to the front counter. She looked radiant, like the poster girl for a fitness club.

"Good morning!" Spencer said, forgoing the canned "Welcome" greeting, since the girl was a regular. The girl looked at Spencer with a shy smile and a soft "Good morning."

Paige sidled up behind Spencer and smiled quickly at the girl, immediately looking down, over Spencer's shoulder, when the girl glanced at her. Paige focused on Spencer's register as her excuse for looking away. She didn't need to see the order, though. She knew it by heart.

Every Saturday and Sunday, the beautiful, tanned customer came in, fresh off her morning run, dabbed her forehead with a napkin, and ordered a Morning Refresher smoothie plus protein, multi-vitamin, and super-grains enhancers. As Paige went to prepare the drink, the girl undid the Velcro strap securing her phone case to her left forearm and produced the exact chage for the smoothie (She knew the price by heart.),plus a dollar for the tip jar.

And, every Saturday and Sunday, Paige went over to make the smoothie, taking surreptitious peeks at the girl's reflection in the mirrored surface of the smoothie machine, and trying her best to fight the trembling in her hands as she put the lid on top of the cup and ripped the bottom half of the wrapper off of the straw that she inserted into the lid.

Every Saturday and Sunday, she psyched herself up to say something to the girl, like "Here you go," or even "You're welcome," in reply to the girl's soft "Thank you." But, every day, she stood there, mute and smiling, like a three-year-old being introduced to the class on her first day at a new preschool - and turned quickly to wipe down the smoothie machine.

On her way out of the store, the girl stopped to look at a printed sheet of paper that someone had taped in the window. It was advertising a pottery class that was starting that evening. Emily peeked up at the counter before she took hold of the poster with three fingers of her left hand - the one holding the smoothie - and used her right hand to tear off one of the tabs at the bottom that had the address and phone number for the class.

"I'm just going to wipe down the tables," Paige announced, grabbing a wet towel. Spencer just shook her head. She knew that Paige wanted to get closer to the windows, as she always did when the girl left, the better to watch as the girl walked away.

Paige gave a couple of tables a few quick swipes as she worked her way over to the spot where her favorite customer had stopped a few seconds earlier. Checking to make sure that Spencer wasn't looking, she took one of the tabs from the poster and quickly hid it in her pocket.

* * *

 _What am I doing here?_ Paige's internal voice whined. She had shown up early, as usual, afraid of walking into a room full of strangers, but being early gave her more time to second-guess her decision to show up in the first place. She was standing by herself in a lonely corner, occupying herself with her phone, when she was startled by the feather-light touch of fingers on her shoulder.

"Paige?"

When Paige turned around and saw the girl from the smoothie shop, her heart, already racing because of the unexpected contact, started beating even faster.

"I thought that was you," the girl said, adding quickly, when she saw the confused look in Paige's eyes, "Oh, sorry. That was rude. I got your name from your..." She used her index fingers and thumbs to form the shape of a name tag against her chest, in the spot where Paige wore her Smoothie World name tag. "I'm Emily. I didn't mean to startle you," she said, with an apologetic squeeze of Paige's shoulder.

There was a slight tremble in Emily's voice, and she kept looking at Paige's nose, rather than her eyes. That gave Paige a little bit of confidence.

"Is Spencer coming, too?" Emily wanted Paige to know that she knew Spencer's name, too, reasoning that it would make it seem less creepy that she knew Paige's. Also, she didn't want to cross any boundaries. She saw the way that Paige always stood so close to Spencer, peering over her shoulder, when Emily gave her order. And, just that morning, she had seen Spencer's hands on Paige's shoulders when she came iin.

Paige twisted her face. "Spencer? No!" She was a little disappointed. Part of her was trying to convince herself that there was a reason that Emily came in to the store every weekend - a reason other than the smoothies. But, apparently, that reason was Spencer. Paige wasn't surprised, though. After all, Spencer was the one who greeted Emily every day with that damned sexy voice of hers.

"Oh." Emily chuckled shyly, looking off to the side. "Good." _Wait... what did I just say?_ "I... I mean, good because... you know. I... I think they're going to make us work in pairs, so, you know... if you're here with Spencer... I'd have to find a partner."

"Oh..." Emily's shy smile was disarming. "Nope, I'm not with Spencer. I... I'm not... _here_ with Spencer." Paige could feel any vestige of dignity being sucked out of her body.

"Oh." Emily chuckled nervously again. She scrunched her face in an adorably vulnerable way. "So, do you think we could team up?"

Paige nodded eagerly, the best response that she could give, since all of the words she knew had flown out of her head when Emily looked into her eyes. Emily tugged Paige's elbow. "Let's find a good seat."

Paige stood in place for a second, trying to calm herself down. Emily looked back with an inviting smile, her wide eyes asking, "Are you coming?"

Paige smiled and shoved her phone into her back pocket, taking a couple of quick steps to catch up with Emily.

There was a potter's wheel in the front and center of room, with a stool next to it. Around it, in a semicircle, were several other wheels, each with a pair of stools. Emily pointed to an empty station and looked at Paige for confirmation.

Emily pulled her stool back and sat down, asking, "So, what made you decide to take a pottery class?"

Paige opened her mouth before she thought of how she could respond. "I... uh... I don't know!" she said with a pleasant, innocent smile.

Before she could explain further, she felt Emily squeezing her forearm as she agreed, "I know, right? I just saw that poster in your store, and I thought, 'Well, this could be fun...'"

"Okay, full disclosure..." Paige began, idly pumping the pedal of the wheel, watching as it rotated about a quarter turn. "I... kind of came because I saw you take the little thing from the poster." Once the words were out, Paige face-palmed, hiding her eyes from Emily.

Emily tilted her head back and laughed, but it was obvious that she was laughing with Paige, not at her. "Well, I'm flattered," she said with another squeeze of Paige's arm.

"Either that or creeped out," Paige said with a shy shrug, starting to relax.

"I... wasn't sure that you saw me take it," Emily admitted.

The way that Emily said that sentence - haltingly, with her voice lowered - and the way that she bit her lip afters she got the words out - let Paige know that she had wanted Paige to see her take it.

All of a sudden, Paige wasn't interested in the pottery class. Not that she had been interested before, but, at that point, she just wanted to be in a booth somewhere with Emily, smiling and chatting over coffee.

Although, part of her really did want to be there. Her mind started to wander to that scene from the movie, "Ghost." She really wanted to be Patrick Swayze to Emily's Demi Moore. Or Emily could be Patrick and she'd be Demi. Hell, she'd even be Whoopi Goldberg, if it meant...

 _Oh shit!_

When Paige saw Emily reaching for her phone, she knew that she was blowing it - sitting there in a trance, dreaming about the girl who was sitting right next to her instead of actually carrying on a conversation with her. No wonder Emily got bored and reached for her phone.

"Let me get your number." Emily was trying to act casual as she swiped her phone unlocked, but, when Paige just sat there staring blankly, she realized that she had been too forward. It was too late to take back what she had said, though, so she tried to make it seem like a casual request; an afterthought, even. "You know," she said, swiveling her stool slightly in her nervous energy, "in case I have some kind of pottery or smoothie emergency..."

Paige shook her head quickly to get back into the moment - the moment where the girl of her dreams was asking for her number. "Here, you know what?" She reached for Emily's phone, enjoying skin-on-skin contact for the first time when her fingers brushed against Emily's. "Let me put it in there for you."

Emily smiled as Paige, successfully having input the digits, handed the phone back to her. She saved the contact and began typing. "Now... I'll give you mine..."

Paige pulled her phone out of her pocket and read the text that Emily sent to transmit her phone number, immediately going into a fit of giggles as she read, "Coffee l8r? ;)" She covered her mouth and tried to get serious as she typed back a sequence of emojis - blushing, giggling, winking, and thumbs up.

"Wow. That's got to be the first time I've actually watched someone giggle as she texted me a giggle!"

* * *

It was 8:30 on Sunday morning, so Spencer wasn't surprised to find Paige in front of the smoothie machine. This time, though, she was actually making a smoothie, not just using the machine as a mirror.

"Being proactive?" she asked. "Are you actually going to talk to the girl today?" she teased, knocking shoulders with Paige.

Paige just smiled knowingly, walking up to the counter with the smoothie behind her back as Emily approached.

Before Spencer could offer her usual, "Good morning," Paige with a beaming smile, said, "Hi, Em!" and produced the smoothie from behind her back.

"Em?" Spencer mouthed, confused.

"Hi, Paige! Wow! That's service! I knew there was a reason that I keep coming back here!"

She handed Spencer the money and the tip before Spencer even had time to ring her up, giving Paige's arm a thank-you squeeze. Instead of heading to the door, she made her way to a table in the back, smiling over at Paige behind the counter as she settled into a seat.

"Okay, what the..."

"You know what, Spencer?" Paige took off her apron as she interrupted her befuddled co-worker. "I'm going to take my break early today!"


	2. Deleted Scenes

**A/N: Two of my most trusted reviewers, Feriel2017 and subway20, pointed out a couple of things that I left out of this one-shot. Here are some deleted scenes to fill in those blanks.**

 **(For the record, this is still a one-shot...)**

* * *

 **Scene I: Pottery Class**

At 7:30 on the dot, the instructor showed up, looking like something straight out of the 60s with his clogs, loose-fitting denim cut-offs, tie-dyed t-shirt, and Grateful Dead bandana. He seemed a pleasant enough fellow, and he spoke in a low, soothing voice, introducing himself to the class and explaining what the course would cover. When he asked for a show of hands to see whether or not any of the students had any experience making pottery, Paige looked at Emily, and Emily looked at Paige, each relieved that the other was as clueless as she was.

"I bet you're going to be some kind of pottery genius!" Paige whispered.

"What do you mean?"

"Like, I bet you pick it up right away. You'll be making museum pieces before the night's over." Emily nudged Paige with her elbow, rolling her eyes. "I know your type," Paige continued. "You can pick up anything on the first try."

The instructor, distracted by their whispering, lost his train of thought and stopped, mid-sentence, glaring at the two of them. The eyes of the rest of the class followed his glare. Paige looked down, contrite and embarrassed. Emily couldn't help giggling. Paige stared at her, wide-eyed, silently pleading with her to pull it together.

The instructor explained that, for their first night, they were just going to get a feel for the movement of the wheel and for working with clay. It wasn't about making anything, but about learning the steps. "Don't worry what it looks like. It's not supposed to look like anything, yet."

As he put a tattered, clay-stained smock over his ensemble, he pointed them to a rack in the back of the room, where they could grab smocks of their own. While they did that, he went from station to station, putting clay on their wheels.

* * *

Paige was getting frustrated. Even though she knew that they weren't actually making anything, she didn't feel that she was getting the hang of it. She hadn't really been paying attention to the instructor as he gave the overview of how to use the wheel and manipulate the clay. She found herself more interested in the instep of Emily's foot and the way her sandal dangled beneath it. When Emily turned her head in Paige's direction, Paige looked up at the instructor quickly, pretending that she had been paying attention to him all along. She wasn't sure whether or not Emily had caught her staring, but, either way, Emily let her sandal fall to the floor and began stroking her instep against Paige's calf. Looking up to make sure that the instructor's attention was elsewhere, Emily reached over and pulled Paige's stool closer to her, smiling innocently as she did.

When it was Emily's turn at the wheel, she wasn't much better than Paige. Not that any of the first-timers were any good; Paige was the only one who was letting it get to her. Emily was enjoying the experience. It felt good to be able to work with her hands. Paige looked on as Emily got the turntable moving and started to make a pretty respectable cylinder on it. It was annoying. "Whoops," Paige said as she stuck a finger in the path of Emily's spinning tube, causing bits of clay to fly off and making the cylinder collapse. "Clumsy me!"

One of the flying pieces landed dead-center on Emily's chin. "Hey!" She tugged at her chin to remove the errant clay, which she smudged on Paige's cheek. "Watch those fingers, McCullers!"

"These fingers?" Paige dipped two fingers in a glob of wet clay and tried to give Emily a clay moustache, but Emily was too quick, swatting her hands away. Paige stood up with a devilish look in her eye, to get some leverage.

Their instructor was two stations over, working with a pair of students who, like the rest of the class, were actually trying to learn something. Hearing the commotion, he cleared his throat loudly. "Paige? Emily?" Paige sat down quickly and pretended that she was sculpting again. Emily taunted her with a smirk. Even though she was teasing, Paige found it incredibly sexy.

Paige was still working the wheel when the instructor made it over to them and asked, "How's it coming?"

"I think I'm getting the hang of it," Paige lied. Emily tickled her thigh under the table, causing her to lose her rhythm and to bang her knee against the wheel. She let out a yelp, more in surprise than in pain.

"You know," the instructor scolded, "there are a lot of people who genuinely want to be here tonight. If the two of you just want to play games, I can suggest a lot of other places where you can do that."

"We're sorry," Emily pleaded in her sweetest voice. Hearing it, Paige knew that she would forgive Emily for anything, whenever she used that tone. "We're just, you know... feeling mellow." Emily's smile was full of innuendo.

"Uh huh." This was something the instructor could relate to. "Well, may I remind you that this is _pottery_ class, not just _pot_. Please be a little less 'mellow' for the next class."

The instructor moved on, and Paige looked at Emily, confused.

"He thinks we're…" She held her fingers to her lips, miming smoking a joint.

Paige, stunned, stifled a gasp. "Emily, I _never_!"

"Neither have I!" Emily protested. "I just knew that he would be able relate to that excuse!" Paige shook her head in disbelief. "Hey! You were the one who got us into this mess in the first place!"

* * *

Paige sighed, looking at her watch, wondering how much longer.

Before long, she and Emily were hanging up their smocks and heading to the sink to wash their hands. They walked out of the building and stood, awkwardly looking at each other.

"So."

"So."

"So, someone mentioned coffee?"

"Coffee," Emily said through a yawn. "That sounds good right about now."

"We can take a raincheck, if you're too tired..."

Emily scrunched her face. "Are you sure?"

Paige nodded her head with a reassuring smile. She had been looking forward to their coffee date, but it was all right. They didn't need to rush. She had the feeling that they would have plenty of time to get to know each other.

Emily smiled sweetly, taking Paige's hand. "Walk me home?"

Paige was smiling hard, too distracted by the feeling of Emily's hand wrapped around hers to reply. She just smiled and let Emily lead the way.

The walk was pleasant but brief. Emily rested her head on Paige's shoulder, yawning occasionally and apologizing each time, assuring Paige that the yawns were from exhaustion and not boredom. She stopped in front of an apartment building, standing in front of Paige and taking both of her hands, swinging them lightly. "Well, this is me!"

Paige dipped her head, wondering how to summon up the courage for the way she wanted to end their evening. Before she knew it, Emily was leaning in to press a kiss against her lips. "I had fun tonight!"

"Same," Paige assured her with a nervous chuckle, "even though you got me in trouble!"

Emily opened her mouth to protest, but she just laughed it off instead. She gave Paige a quick kiss and confirmed, "I'll see you tomorrow?"

Paige nodded eagerly. Emily trotted up the walkway, using her access card to open the front door as she turned around to give Paige a final wave and disappeared inside the building.

Paige rubbed her fingers over her tingling lips before she shook her head at how sappy she was being. Tucking her hands in her pockets with a contented sigh, she started the short walk home.

* * *

 **Scene II: Paige's Smoothie Break**

Paige mixed herself a smoothie and took a seat across the table from Emily. Emily reached for Paige's cup, stirring the beverage with the straw as, with a sly look in her eye, she told Paige, "I've always wondered what kind of smoothie an insider would drink."

"Try it," Paige urged enthusiastically.

Emily gave her a wink and sniffed at the cup, never breaking eye contact. "What's in it?" Before Paige could reply, Emily puckered her lips around the straw and took a tentative sip. "Ew! EWW!" she protested through tightly closed lips, waving her hand in front of her face and scrambling around, desperate for a napkin. Paige sat watching her, frozen in confusion at what the problem was.

Emily found a napkin and spat into it, wiping her mouth on her forearm before spitting theatrically several more times. She took a sip of her wheatgrass and kale smoothie, to expunge the taste from her mouth. She glared at Paige. "What the hell is wrong with you?" she laughed.

"Huh?"

"What is in this?" Emily demanded, waving the cup in front of Paige's face.

"Pineapple juice, some coconut, and a dash of sriracha to give it... you know - a little kick."

"God, Paige!"

Paige took the cup from Emily's hands and took a long sip, shrugging her shoulders as she concluded that there was nothing wrong with it.

Emily shook her head, pointing her finger at Paige. "Never make me drink that again!"

Paige dipped her head. "Sorry..."

Emily grabbed Paige's wrists and smiled at her, to let her know that she wasn't mad, just teasing. "Seriously, though, how can you drink that?"

"Well, it's better than that cow cocktail you're drinking," Paige retorted with smiling eyes.

"Oh, shut up and kiss me!" Emily reached behind Paige's head and pulled her in. She stopped with Paige's lips less than an inch away. "Wait..." Emily wiped Paige's mouth with her palm and stroked her thumb over Paige's lips a couple of times for good measure before she kissed her.

Paige rolled her eyes and kissed her again. "You're hilarious," she droned.

Spencer stood watching, idly tossing the balled up towel that she had been using to wipe down the counter a couple of inches in the air and catching it again as she observed the two of them, stunned but pleased by what she saw.

* * *

Paige pushed her break as long as she possibly could, but eventually, she had to get back to work. She walked Emily to the door, placing a hand on her waist as she gave her a kiss good-bye.

Spencer busied herself wiping down the smoothie machine, to give them their privacy, but as soon as Paige made it back behind the counter, she gave her an enthusiastic hug, demanding all the details.


End file.
